Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Unlike my list of a couple week’s ago, when it comes to novels from the 20th Century there is no need to even pause and think about those I haven’t read. Harder is to decide what to list. When I read the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, I think either I’ve got a lot of living left to do before I die, or I’m in trouble.

But it doesn't mean a heck of a lot to say I haven’t read Gravity’s Rainbowor Finnegans Wake, let alone any by Nabokov (tried Pale Fire – got bored) or the entire seven volumes of In Search of Lost Time. Hardly anyone has read all of those. I own a copy of Swann’s Way; have tried it twice, and both times I stopped as though in a slumber at around page 120. I once chatted with a friend of mine who was doing a PhD in English Lit and she said exactly the same thing. Maybe page 120 is just really dull?

So what I shall list is those novels which one would just assume that someone who loves books as much as I do would have read by the time of reaching the age of 37.

1. Tolkien – The Lord of the Rings

Year in year out, The Lord of the Rings comes first in reader polls on the favourite book of all time. It is possibly my wife’s favourite novel (or at least squarely in the Top 5). And yet I have read only about 160 odd pages of this huge fantasy tome. I have read The Hobbit – and enjoyed it quite a lot, and so I started TLOTR with great enthusiasm. But around page 160 in the first volume, I hit Tom Bombadil, and I got bored very, very quickly. There is absolutely no surprise that Peter Jackson left him out of the films, and even less surprise than hardly any of the fans of the books really cared all that much.

Maybe I’ll try it again, but to be honest, I enjoy the films so much (well the first two and half of the third), that I probably won’t, instead I’ll just get the DVDs off the shelf and settle in to watch the 9 hours of Frodo and Sam trouping off to Mount Doom (and trying to ignore thinking why doesn’t Gandalf just give it to one of those big eagles to fly it over the volcano and drop it in?).

Obviously I’m not a fantasy lover (you couldn’t be and not have read these books), but I have to admit thinking I should have given these novels more of a go.

2. Salinger – The Catcher in the Rye

OK, this one is just dopey! How does someone who was a wannabe angry young man in a hurry in his late teens get through life without having read about the exploits of Holden Caulfield?

When I was in Year 10 we were given a choice, we could read this, or we could read Robert Cormier’s The Chocolate War. I chose The Chocolate War. I think I chose it because I had no idea what the title” The Catcher in the Rye” meant and I thought the novel would be about someone in a rural setting involving farms and harvesting rye (yes I know…). As it is I have no need to read the novel now because I have read enough parts of the novel while studying other novels, that I don’t feel any need to go back and read every page. I even quoted a line Caulfield says about his brother D.B. in an essay I wrote at uni – “He’s out in Hollywood… being a prostitute”. I figure, if you’ve cited a novel in a uni paper, that absolves you of not having actually read it!

And anyway, it’s a novel that should be read before you turn 20. I’m well past that.

Some argue this is the greatest coming of age novel, it has been my contention that all such novels are mere shadows of the brilliant Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. I’d much rather re-read about the frenzied mind of Raskolnikov.

3. Golding – Lord of the Flies

Another that is almost impossible to get through High School without reading. And yet I did it. This time I’m not sure which novel I read instead it may have been To Sir With Love (yep, it’s actually a novel), or possibly it was The Chocolate War (it’s getting a while ago now!) but as with The Catcher in the Rye, this one now seems pointless for me to go back to. I have a couple Golding novels on my shelf – The Spire and Rites of Passage – I’ll give those a go first.

Anyway this story, much like Robinson Crusoe, is known so well that it is known to those who haven’t even read it. It’s a metaphor now. It’s so well known that The Simpsons did a whole episode parodying it, and I knew what parts they were actually parodying, and I haven’t read it or even seen the film versions of it. Some books are like that – they become so well known they seep into your consciousness. They are part of our world now. Lord of the Flies, 1984… in Australian literature I’d say A Fortunate Life has almost reached that stage. I haven’t read that one either, and yet through TV, and various bits of it gathered through my life I would probably feel like I had already read it were I actually to open the pages and read.

I once was the fiction editor of a literary journal, and the plethora of short stories written by retired people hoping to be the next AB Facey certainly put me off ever wanting to read it.

But as to Lord of the Flies? If you should read Catcher by the age of 20, this one almost requires being read by 16.

4. Rushdie – Midnight’s Children

OK, this one is perhaps a bit more “literary” than the others. But Rushdie is one of perhaps the great bought but not read authors of the last 30 years, and I admit I’m in that camp. I have this and The Satanic Verses (bought would you believe for $5 from a bargain bin in Woolworths!).

I started reading it a few years back, but a few pages in I got sick of the attention paid to the noses of the characters, and I thought - “ah it’s one of those “magical realism” tricks where a character has a special trait – similar to The Tin Drum where the character stops growing at the age of 5 (or whatever it is). And so I thought “pass”. I don’t mind magical realism – I love One Hundred Years of Solitude and I think Jorge Borges is one of the true geniuses of 20th Century Literature – but I wasn’t in the mood for it at the time.

I will get back to this one though one day – a number of people have told me it is fantastic, and it did win the Booker of Bookers, so it must have something going for it. But to be honest, Rushdie is lauded by so many critics, that I almost have a subconscious resistance to his work. It is almost that because he is so highly regarded that I refuse to be impressed and am put off reading his novels (that and none of the blurbs on the back have ever interested me).

Which brings me to Number 5…

5. Winton – Cloudstreet

I haven’t read any Tim Winton. The fact that he has just won his fourth Miles Franklin makes me even less inclined to read this (his oft called best work) or any others of his novels.

They just don’t appeal to me. They all seem to be about the beach, the connection with the environment, Western Australia… It just doesn’t interest me. I must admit The Ridersseems interesting – and a good friend of mine highly recommended it. But the rest? Meh.

To be honest, I could have also included any number of novels by Peter Carey as Number 5. I have read Bliss and The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith and I hated them both. Tristan Smith I found particularly awful – such a waste of a good premise. But Oscar and Lucinda, Jack Maggs, the True History of the Kelly Gang? Haven’t been tempted. OK, I have thought about reading Jack Maggs, but to be honest, I’d rather re-read Great Expectations. Maybe I don’t like how Carey comes across in interviews; perhaps I hate how Australian critics seem to have made every effort to praise him to the skies in some attempt to get him the Nobel Prize. Whatever the reason, he just doesn’t do it for me.

In fact there is a lot of Australian literature I haven’t read – Kate Grenville, Janet Turner Hospital, Thea Astley… Looking at the winners of the Miles Franklin Award since 1980, I have only read David Foster’s Glade Within a Grove(really, really hated it), Christopher Koch’s Highway’s to a War(did enjoy) and Bliss. Clearly I have a big gap in my reading history here. The only Australian author I could say I have read extensively is Thomas Keneally – Confederates is a great novel.

Will I read more Australian authors in the future? Possibly – I enjoyed last year’s PM’s Literary Award winner The Zookeeper’s War and I am interested in a few of the novels by Steven Carroll. But I don’t read out of any patriotic sense of duty. Recent Australian fiction – as with all contemporary novels from the US and Britain – have to compete for space on my “must read list” with the likes of Solzhenitsyn, Lawrence, Dickens, Mann, Eliot and Hardy. It’s a tough list to crack, and it needs more than to be about the freedom of the countryside and the incandescence of the coast to pique my interest.

***

So that’s my list. I will probably do another one – a more “literary” one, because a lot of this list just looks like a skipped a few lessons of Year 10 English; although perhaps it’s time to write about books I actually have read…

Monday, June 29, 2009

Last Wednesday I said that Malcolm Turnbull had had the worst seven days by any opposition leader in Australian political history. Today came statistical proof that I was right.

This morning out came three polls - Galaxy, Nielson and Newspoll. It didn't matter which one you read - they were all the same and they were all very, very bad for Malcolm Turnbull. In Newspoll his dissatisfaction rating rose 7% to a whopping 58%. Over on Nielson it went up to 60%. His satisfaction rating in Newspoll fell from a career best 44% to a career worst 25%. On Nielson it fell to 32%.

So in net terms, according to Newspoll he has a net satisfaction rating of minus 33; according to Nielson it is minus 28. For Newspoll, it was the single biggest drop in a leader's satisfaction rating ever.

Nielson also asked who voters preferred as leader of the Liberal Party. Peter Costello, who has essentially retired from the game, got 37%; Joe Hockey, who doesn't want the job (yet), got 21%; Turnbull got 18%; Don't Know took in 14%; and Tony "People Skills" Abbott, 10% (it's compulsory by the way to now refer to Abbott as "People Skills").

It is not going too far into the realms of hyperbole to say things aren't good for the Liberal Party when its leader only has 4% more of the population wanting him to lead the party than "Don't Know".

The most Liberal-friendly paper is The Australian. It's banner headline this morning was:Polling smashes Turnbull

In the story, one of the most Liberal-friendly journalists, Dennis Shanahan, wrote the following:

MALCOLM Turnbull's political career has been smashed in just one week, and senior Liberals believe there could be moves within the party to remove him as Opposition Leader within days or weeks.Not good.

Things got marginally better for Turnbull as the day went on, but I doubt these are the kinds of headlines he was dreaming about when Costello announced he was quitting only less than two weeks ago:

Liberals rule out bid to overthrow Malcolm Turnbull

Why do they rule it out? Well, because they've got no one else:

Other senior MPs, asking for anonymity, backed Mr Abbott, saying no-one was happy with the poll or last week's events but that most of the party accepted Mr Turnbull would learn from his errors. They said there was an expectation Mr Turnbull, in only his second term in Parliament, could use a planned frontbench reshuffle to promote seasoned political operators including Mr Abbott. The MPs also said that the only person being mentioned as a serious alternative leader – Sydney MP Joe Hockey – was making clear to colleagues that Mr Turnbull should remain leader.

Always a good look when a senior MP will back the leader of the party only on the condition of anonymity!

But God bless the Liberal Party, they still have people like Christopher Pyne, fresh back from his trip to Israel, where he has seen his position as Leader of Opposition Business been completely blown to bits by Tony Abbott, come out today and say on radio that Kevin Rudd is "drunk with power". Even were it true, it's still better than Turnbull's performance of the last 10 days in which he pretty much has just seemed to be drunk.

Tony Abbott has kept up his defence of the leader (note to Malcolm, if you turn around and the only one there is Abbott, it's time to rethink your strategy). On AM this morning he restated his spiel that he has been trying for the last couple of days:

TONY ABBOTT: Sabra, look we had a very tough week last week and when you've had a tough week you tend to get bad polls. Let's not forget that the Labor Party threw everything but the kitchen sink at Malcolm last week and I think that the smear campaign that they waged has had an impact.

But just as Malcolm didn't flinch last week, it's important that the party doesn't flinch this week. We have a good leader, he's going to lead us through to the next election and we've got to get behind him.

Amazing - Turnbull essentially calls Rudd and Swan corrupt on the basis of a fake email, and yet it's the ALP that has been guilty of smearing! And if Turnbull ain't flinching, then maybe someone in the Liberal Party should consider asking him why not?

Here's the Liberal Party's strategy to overcome 60% of the population thinking Turnbull is doing a lousy job and having only 47% describing him as "trustworthy" :

SABRA LANE: How can he rebuild trust and respect with voters?

TONY ABBOTT: Well he rebuilds by doing what oppositions always do, which is pointing out the flaws and the weaknesses in the government. And a government which was debt free a year ago has, in the course of the last 12 months, been borrowing $2 billion a week. Now that's real in a way that these polls are not.

So he will rebuild trust by trying to point out what is wrong with Rudd (whom 70% describe as trustworthy). Good luck with that.

The problem is that Abbott and Pyne and others who think Turnbull will learn from this and bounce back are thinking this is like a bad loss in a football match. It's not. This poll is like a horror restaurant review. If every newspaper in the country and all the TV stations run a review stating that there are dead rats in a restaurant's kitchen; well it doesn't matter how much you clean, people are not going to forget that review. It will take a very long time before you're going to take your family out to dine there. (And by the time people do, new management will be in place.)

When you go to a restaurant you're trusting that things are clean; it is the only thing that will stop you from going in the door. You could tell all of your friends that the restaurant does a lousy fish of the day, and yet some will still go (they'll just try the steak). But tell anyone the kitchen was filthy and the toilets dirty, well that'd pretty much be enough to stop them all from ever eating there - even years later when someone at work suggests going there for Christmas lunch, they'll say "Oh, I've heard bad things..."

Turbull is that bad restaurant. He can try and gussy up the dining room all he likes, he can rearrange the decor (apparently he's planning to reshuffle the front bench), but on Election Day people will be thinking "Oh, I've heard bad things...".

People hope for a good meal, just like they hope for a good Government. But they expect the restaurant to be hygienic - no point making a fancy degustation menu if 60% of your diners get salmonella. Similarly, changing Governments requires first that voters believe the opposition leader will keep the Governmental kitchen clean. With Turnbull the reviews are coming in - he likes trying to serve up the Michelin 3 star food, but his kitchen would make a roadhouse restaurant look like a hospital.

People aren't going to forget that, and it's going to take more than new tablecloths to change their minds. The Liberal Party should start thinking about cutting its losses and change the management.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

In my previous post on Michael Jackson, I was pretty cynical about people rushing out and buying Jackson CDs despite not having felt the need to do so for the last 10, 15 whatever number of years.

And yet despite not being a fan at all (in fact I think pretty much everything he did post "Bad" was pretty dire) I found myself going on youtube and listening to a number of his songs and watching his performance of Billie Jean at the Mowtown 25th Anniversary Concert. And even for this non-fan it brought back a lot of memories, and I felt some sadness that such a pop genius (and let's be honest, you don't get people buying so many of your songs that you have 47 of the Top 100 singles in the US just through dumb luck - the guy could sing and write pop songs like almost no one else ever has) is gone.

But I'm not really sure why I am feeling sad - is it for the boy who was so amazing when performing I Want You Back at the age of 11? Or is it for the guy who could write such a great ballad as Human Nature or a great rock song as Dirty Diana, or any of the other 2 dozen or so songs that you know all the words to even though you don't even like Michael Jackson songs?

Perhaps, but I think more I feel sad (or at least wistful) for the person who I was when I first heard the music. I remember listening to "Dirty Diana" quite a lot in 1988 (it was on the short list for my "A Song a Year"), and when I hear it now I remember vividly having the song (and the rest of the "Bad" tape) playing on my little mono-tape player while doing a major Legal Studies project in Year 12. The song brings back for me Smash Hits magazines, caring about who won the Grammy Awards, and High School socials.

But music constantly does this - it's why I write a "A Song a Year" post, and not "A Movie a Year", and you don't need to be Nick Hornby to realise this.

Forget novelists, film stars, athletes, footy players, politicians. If you want to have an impact on a person's life, become a musician. I remember when the whole Heidi Fliess call-girl scandal broke, one of the call-girls said of the claim by Billy Idol that he never paid for the girls that it was true, because all of the girls wanted to sleep with the rock stars who came to the parties. Rock stars and pop stars, for whatever reason, always have a deeper impact on our psyche than other cultural heroes.

And so Jackson's passing doesn't cut me to the bone, but I know if it had been Madonna or Bono, I'd be feeling pretty hollow because so many of my teenage memories have their music playing on my soundtrack. I am sure most of those people who are now buying Jackson's CDs are buying the ones they remember the most from crucial parts of their life. Maybe they're just playing the songs and closing their eyes and imagining they're back in Year 10, trying to get up the courage to ask a girl or guy they like to dance with them and the year-end social. (And who knows, maybe they're buying them because now they feel like it's ok to buy them again)

It is highly doubtful that Jackson was ever going to write a song that was going to impact on a new generation of high school kids like any of his 1980s tracks did - he had well and truly peaked years ago - and so musically speaking not much has been lost with his death.

But such was his reach, that if you were a kid in the 80s or 90s, regardless of whether you liked it or not, his music was there and like it or not, it always will be.

Friday, June 26, 2009

Michael Jackson died today. That's just in case you lost use of all your senses today, have only recently recovered them, and you decided to come here before anywhere else on the web.

Now to be honest it doesn't really affect me much. I don't own any of his CDs, and wasn't a big fan of his growing up. I think I once had a dubbed tape of his "Bad"album - quite liked the song "Dirty Diana". But he was such an enigma that he wasn't real in any sense that he impacted on our lives on a daily basis.

Now take say Madonna - she is still recording, putting out some pretty cool songs, and is in the magazines most weeks. She is a real presence in life - even in that peripheral celebrity fixated sense. If she were to die suddenly, whoah! That would hit me (and probably also because I was a huge fan of hers in the 80s and early 90s). In fact I'm betting a lot more people would be looking at each other at work saying "What?? You're kidding me!?" than what happened today.

Jackson was such a recluse that we'll hardly notice his lack of presence.

When I got home from work on the USA itunes store, 18 of the top 100 singles were by Michael Jackson. A couple hours later he now has 20 songs in the Top 100 (6 in the top 25), and 19 of the Top 100 Albums - (6 of the Top 10). On the Australian version, 14 of his tracks in the top 100, and 12 of his albums are in the Top 100 Albums.

Now what I want to know is why because he has now died would someone who up till this point has not bought Thriller, would want to buy Thriller? But forget Thriller, because that's actually a good album, but why on earth would you now want to buy the "We Are the World" EP? And yet that is now Number 49 on the US chart!

Perhaps people want to have a collective remembrance of his songs, and I know this happens when any famous musician dies (certainly did with John Lennon and Elvis), but I have to say, I don't get it. His last album, Invincible, was released in 2001, I'm thinking if you didn't like what you heard 8 years ago when you decided not to buy it, it'll be much the same now.

His Greatest Hits CD, "The Essential Michael Jackson" released in 2005, only sold 420,000 copies in the USA (by comparison Thriller sold 28 million copies in the US). It is now Number 1 on itunes in Australia and the USA, and will no doubt be one of the biggest selling albums of the year.

Perhaps people subconsciously think that now he is dead no more of his CDs will be made, so they better get them before they run out!

Or perhaps, it's just a case of no publicity is bad publicity - and his death is the biggest publicity he'll have ever gotten.

UPDATE: Woke up this morning - Jackson now has 25 singles in the Australian itunes Top 100 (plus 4 by The Jacksons), and 20 Albums. In the US, he now has 40(!!!!) singles in the Top 100 (plus 4 by The Jacksons) - 11 songs in the Top 20. Last night he had 19 Albums in the Top 100, now he has 23 - including the all of the Top 9! Over on Amazon, the top 16 selling albums are all Michael Jackson ones.

Absolutely amazing. The reports yesterday were that his estate was in debt. I doubt that'll be the case now.

UPDATE #2. Well he now has 42 singles in the US Top 40 (plus 5 by The Jacksons). That's almost 50% of the entire top 100. Truly amazing (though there are a few of double ups - eg 3 versions of "Beat It"). He now has 29 singles in the Australian Top 100.

Whatever you can say, you can't say people didn't like his music.

The general consensus across the world is that "Man in the Mirror" is his most popular track.

I was also thinking that he really is the first major pop singer to die unexpectedly in the itunes era. In the past, record stores would sell out of his records (no doubt JBHiFi have almost been stripped bare). But there is no selling out of stock on itunes. It will be very interesting to see just how many albums/singles he sells this week. I'd say without any trouble he will sell more music this week than anyone ever has.

It is a weird effect - I have to admit almost considering downloading some of his songs - but I found my time much better served by watching a few videos on youtube.

It’s easy to be cynical of people who are feeling absolutely shattered at the moment. But I’d say most of us have musicians with whom for whatever illogical reason we feel a connection with. As I said above, were it Madonna who had died, I'd be feeling a lot more emotional about it all. When someone who you put posters of on your wall when you were a teenager dies, it's hard not to feel a part of your memory has as well.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

From next year, the field for Best Picture will consist of 10 films instead of 5.

The Oscars' people say

“Having 10 Best Picture nominees is going to allow Academy voters to recognize and include some of the fantastic movies that often show up in the other Oscar categories, but have been squeezed out of the race for the top prize.”

Don't be fooled. This is all about the studios and TV Networks being annoyed that the five nominated films in recent years have for the most part been poor box office performers.

By having 10 nominations, that means 5 more films can slap "Nominated for Best Picture" on their adverts and movie posters, and it also means there will be a much greater likelihood that films like The Dark Knight will get nominated, and thus more people might actually tune in to watch the Award ceremony.

Had there been 10 nominations last year, The Dark Knight, Wall-E and Grand Torino would likely have been nominated. And who knows, maybe Mamma Mia as well. I think what will likely happen is the field will consist of pretty much all the films that get nominated for Best Drama and Best Comedy/Musical for the Golden Globes. So if it does lead to more comedies getting a chance to win, then I'm all for it.

But hey, at the end of the day, the Oscars have always been about money. No matter how many films get nominated, we'll still all disagree with the final choice!

All you need to know about Question Time today is that the first two questions asked by the opposition were about Rudd's dealings with John Grant - and they were asked by Tony Abbott not Malcolm Turnbull. They were about a fund raising event John Grant went to to raise money for Rudd's legal fees incurred in his defence action against the building of a parallel runway at Brisbane airport back in 2002-3. Abbott was in full Uriah Heep mode - 'umbly wanted just to know some information; not suggesting anything at all.

Pathetic. The story - which got a run in The Age - is the dumbest beat up we've had this week (and that says something). If buying a table at a fundraising dinner for Rudd while he was in opposition 5 years before he became PM is now wrong, then 95% of business people from Sydney will be stuffed should Turnbull ever get into power.

Malcolm Turnbull, you see, has a fundraising group known as the "Wentworth Forum" - Who is on it? Well for starters, how about: Frank Lowy, Ros Packer, John Simons, and Matt Handbury?

I'm sure Lowy, Packer, or Simons would want nothing from a Turnbull PM. How much does it cost to be part of this "forum"? Try $5,500 to $55,000. And that's just to get in the door. Back in 2007 it was expected that at the launch of the forum 150 would turn up. Even at the minimum $5,500 a head, that's $825,000... (though it is unlikely all 150 paid that 'little').

Now this launch was put on at Turnbull's home at Point Piper in August 2007. Here's what happened 3 months later...

Matt Hanbury (the fourth of those names above) was chairman and part-owner of the so-called Australian Rain Corporation. I tell you what - I'll let Tony Burke tell the rest (he told it in Parliament on Monday - and Turnbull has not refuted it):

There is an interesting organisation involved in what is described as ‘rainfall enhancement technology’—a company named the Australian Rain Corporation. Apparently they have decided to corporatise rain! The Australian Rain Corporation sought money and the National Water Commission commissioned an independent review of the technology that they were putting forward by a former senior CSIRO officer and professor of physical sciences and engineering from the ANU. The National Water Commission insisted that the Australian Rain Corporation give a presentation of this technology to a panel of physicists. They then provided it with the research papers and made the presentation in Russian. The independent review concluded: ‘There is no convincing evidence that the Atlant technology operates as believed by its proponents.’

But in the end the department recommended that the member for Wentworth provide them with $2 million for a trial, which was arguably a generous offering, given what had been said about the technology. What did the Leader of the Opposition, as a minister, do with a recommendation to give them $2 million? He wrote to the Prime Minister seeking a lazy $10 million for the Australian Rain Corporation. You have to ask: what would be the circumstances of taking a departmental recommendation for $2 million and turning it into $10 million? Why would the Leader of the Opposition have done that as a minister? This is where we discover that an executive of the Australian Rain Corporation happened to be a nextdoor neighbour of the Leader of the Opposition. The same person, the same neighbour, was a member of his electorate fundraising committee, the Wentworth Forum, with membership costing a cool $5,000 to get yourself into the room. If you want to find deals for mates, there are stories of deals for mates and there are stories that rest very squarely with the Leader of the Opposition.

MALCOLM TURNBULL: Kerry, I am not going to talk about Mr Grech. I understand your interest in it, but this is a distraction from the real issue, which is cronyism and the way the Labor Party looks after its mates, rather than managing the economy and managing our finances in the interests of everybody.

Yep looking after mates....The worst the opposition can come up with is that Rudd may have raised on one of his trip to China the interests of an importation company that Grant is a co-owner of. No one has suggested he has done this since becoming PM. When Rudd starts giving a company owned by Grant $8 million more of Government funds than recommended by the relevant Department, get back to me. Until then, the ALP will love the issue of probity being raised, because it gives virtual permission for them to go through every bit of Turnbull's business career...

Turnbull himself didn't ask a question until Hockey had also asked two. It had taken so long for Turnbull to get around to asking one, that the Government benches cheered when he finally stood up.

It was a dumb question about the fake email. He then asked for a Royal Commission into OzCar. Which is rather stupid, given the program hasn't even been set up yet. There is also currently an Auditor's General inquiry underway into the whole process - surely if that reveals anything there will be time for a Royal Commission after that? But can you imagine the Royal Commission:

Commissioner: "Mr Grant have did you receive any money or credit from OzCar?"Grant: "No".Commissioner: "Well...errr OK then. I guess that wraps it all up. Thanks Mr Turnbull for wasting everyone's time and money."

Call me crazy, but I actually like my corruption scandals to involve actual money. If the big perk of being a mate of Rudd's is that Wayne Swan will ring you up and chat for 5 minutes, then call me silly, but I think I'll pass.

And if the Libs are so desperate for a Royal Commission, why didn't they agree to the Senate Inquiry into last Friday's Senate hearings? Guess they don't want to look at everything...

Julie Bishop then asked how Lindsay Tanner knew the email was fake before the AFP had announced it. He was a tad bemused by her line of questioning (and I guess it shows she hasn't heard of the internet). He pointed out that Joe Hockey had actually announced that the AFP had found the email in the house on Monday before anyone else. Bishop then asked the Attorney General if he had given Tanner a heads up. His response? "No"

It was a pretty dire affair for the Lib. They ran out of questions, and couldn't even muster the strength to launch a suspension of standing orders, which is often the go on the last day of a sitting period.

Turnbull obviously won't be dumped yet (though a bad Newspoll next week may hurry things up), but the entire Liberal Party know he's a dead duck and is only there because there's no one else.

Two weeks ago Turnbull came 94th in a poll of the 100 famous Australian people most trust (Rudd came 64th). On the basis of this week's effort, I somehow doubt he would have improved his position.

But that's it for winter. No more QT till Spring. It will be interesting to see what the topic of import will be then (not to mention the participants on either side of the dispatches box).

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Revealed to be utterly bereft of policy or position on anything of weight, Turbull tried to censure Swan twice during Question Time. He had essentially run out of questions, because in answer to every single one the Government was making merry at Turnbull's complete lack of credibility. The Government were so confident they didn't even bother with the Censure motion and just snuffed it out. The fact is Turnbull had nothing new that they needed to defend, and so they wanted nothing more than to keep on answering questions. The Opposition, by contrast, didn't want to ask them.

And yet, so incompetent were the Liberals, that the second motion of censure was the same as the first which had already been defeated - and you're not actually allowed to try and move the same defeated motion. So it was ruled out of order.

A shambles. A rabble. Call it whatever you want. But it wasn't an alternative Government.

Albanese was having so much fun that he compared Turnbull to Mark Latham (something many have been doing privately for sometime):

"Watching the Leader of the Opposition I could have sworn I was witnessing the ghost of Mark Latham. It was all there Mr Speaker - the jaw jutting out, all the fake aggression, all the machismo, all the 'we're going well'. We used to hear it Mr Speaker."

That Albo, and old Beazely supporter, was able to do this no doubt gave him great joy. And it also demonstrates just how confident the ALP are with respect to Turnbull's position.

The fact is, the ALP don't care now whether Turnbull remains, because he is a dead carcass swinging in the breeze. If no one in the Liberal Party cares to cut him down, then he'll just continue to gather flies and a bad smell by the time of the next election.

The second green shoot [of political insight] is the first outline of the next election campaign. Turnbull's personal attacks on Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan mean anything will be fair game.For anyone interested in just how this will go, check out the speeches of Leader of the House Anthony Albanese and Agriculture Minister Tony Burke from Monday afternoon. They sliced and diced Turnbull's business dealings, from Packer to Tourang to Channel 10 and beyond. None of it was pretty.

You see, while the public mostly has an impression of Turnbull, they don't really know what he has actually done in public and private life apart from maybe the Spycatcher trial and the Republic referendum. The ALP will be more than happy to enlighten voters.

The only things saving Turnbull at the moment is that the Liberal Party has no one else. So dire are things, that Tony Abbott's name is even being thrown around; an absolutley amazing point to reach. But if next week's Newspoll shows a significant shift, the Libs may just be desperate enough to try him. He has one more day of parliament before the winter recess. Perhaps the Liberal Party will hope everyone forgets over the next two months. Anyone here think the ALP will let them?

This time last week Turnbull was in raptures. Costello was gone, he had gotten a blip in the polls (if you can call 53-47 a blip). Now look at things...

You know things are terrible when one week after the entire media writing article after article about how Turnbull now has "clean air", the Liberal Party are desperately hoping the entire voting population of Australia has been in a fog.

The worst seven days had by any opposition leader in Australian political history.

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

The big scoop by Chris Uhlmann(perhaps he has found a Deep Throat?) came out tonight that Godwin Grech, he of the fake email, had in fact been Turnbull's mole in the Treasury Department.

Geez.

I mean, geez!!!!

I can't see how Turnbull can survive this. From the story it sounds very much like members of the Liberal Party are not only putting distance between themselves and the email and Grech, but between themselves and Turnbull:

Several Liberals have told the ABC they believe Mr Grech has been supplying information to Mr Turnbull, and one says he knows it to be the case. However, the nature of that information is not known.

Note -supplying information to "Mr Turnbull" not "to the Liberals". Will the Liberal Partty give Turnbull till the newspoll to see how the mood of the public shifts? Perhaps if the polls don't move, they will hope that the voters haven't been paying attention. But given every newspaper in the country had variation on the theme of "Utegate Runs Over Turnbull". I seriously doubt too many people have missed what has happened.

Turnbull in Question Time today displayed a lot of hide, not much sense. He asked Rudd if he stood by his statement of June 4 regarding what he said about a Bennelong car dealer. This is what Rudd said at the time:

MR RUDD - Can I also say to the honourable member that, if he is leaping from one thing to another, the one recollection I have of a member of the public approaching me about their possible access to the car dealership finance arrangement was in fact a car dealership in the seat of Bennelong. It was at a small business function that I attended with the member for Bennelong.

Opposition members interjecting—

Mr RUDD—No, the honourable member asked for an answer and I am giving him an answer. This representative said to me that they were experiencing difficulties in their car dealership and asked if the program was up and running. Upon my return to my office I mentioned that fact to my office. What subsequently occurred in relation to that individual car dealer I have no idea, but I actually said that this is what representation had been made to me. My recollection is that this is the only car dealer who has made such a representation to me; that is the occasion that I recall. If representations were subsequently made by my office concerning that particular dealership, it would be consistent with the representations that were made to me at that time. That is the sum total of my knowledge of it. If there were further to add to it, I would provide it to the honourable member rather than simply having the honourable member stand at the dispatch box and make insinuations.

Now probably Turnbull has an email or something from Grech that shows Rudd got a follow up about this car dealer.

Big deal. Unless Turnbull can show that this dealer is Rudd's long lost love-child from a liaison between he and Julia Gillard in the 1960s, no one will give a damn - because there's no hint of corruption, only perhaps the suggestion that Rudd didn't remember everything about the communication between his office and this nobody dealer. In fact, any communication will just show that John Grant didn't receive any special treatment - because he didn't even get a phone call from Rudd.

After all, when you strip away the sizzle from this sausage, when you get to the matters which are - as the Prime Minister actually put it yesterday - "core and foundational", the real-world corruption equation against the Government is kind of thin.

The Government loved Question Time today, and must be sad that this is the last week before the Winter recess. I wouldn't be surprised if Rudd is trying to think up a reason to recall Parliament for next week. Maybe they need to work through this ETS legislation?? After all next week Gillard would be back, and so too would Peter Costello - two people who would not help Turnbull in any possible way.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Well what a day in parliament. With AFP searches of Grech's house, links to former advisors of Turnbull; new news it seemed every other minute. It was like a John Grisham novel. I half expected Julia Roberts and Denzel Washington to come running into the House screaming "We've got the email!!!"

I'm not even going to try and bother recap everything that happened. But essentially this is it - the Opposition tried to sort of censure Wayne Swan (but not really), and the Government responded by moving a censure motion against Turnbull. Then followed about 3 hours of debate.

My comment is only this - Rudd and the entire Government were in a great mood and were lining up to speak (I'm betting Julia Gillard must be cursing herself for being in Israel this week of all weeks). The Liberals on the other hand ran out of speakers - Turnbull had to speak twice! In fact things got so bad they let Bronwyn Bishop speak! That says more than anything about how they were travelling. The funniest thing was Joe Hockey repeating the news from the ABC that an email had been found by the AFP, and suggesting that the news destroyed Rudd's case. Hockey however failed to realise the AFP had found the email was a fake, which actually destroyed his own case.

Turnbull and the Liberals are now running a million miles an hours away from the email on which they have based their entire attack on Rudd and Swan since 4 June. Turnbull at one point made the sarcastic point towards the Government being so in shock that he had called for Rudd's resignation, saying "I must be the first opposition leader ever to call for the PM to resign!"

Well Malcolm, I think you may be the first to do so on the basis of a fraudulent document....

How confident were the Government? At one point Anthony Albanese put out a call to Peter Costello (who is also in Israel) saying "the nominations for the seat of Higgins close on June 30 - it's not too late to reconsider!"

Turnbull can bluster all he likes, but there is no walking away from the fact everything he has said about Grant, Ozcar and Rudd and Swan rests on the email. It is now proved to be completely fake - the source is still to be discovered. Turnbull's case is in tatters. He can't now pretend the email was of no importance. And if (a big if, admittedly) the source of the email is found to have any connection to the Liberal Party, Turnbull will have to resign, and the Liberal Party will be out of power for a decade.

Today was one of the biggest days in parliament for many, many a year. It was won by the ALP; but it remains to be seen just what the reward will be.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

A few changes – the big one being I have decided to put the Saints at the top. Their win over the Blues was much more impressive than the Cats win in Perth over Fremantle. Who will win in Round 14 though? I wouldn’t put money on either.

Port and the Hawks join Essendon and the Swans in the “need some wins” category. The way the Hawks got steam rolled by the Lions in Tasmania does not bode well.

I’ve changed the “still fighting” category to “looking good” as the Blues, Pies, Lions and Crows are fighting for 5 spots, which isn’t much of a fight!

Rank

LW

Team

Record

Comment

Safe

1

2↑

St Kilda

12-0

A great match against the Blues, and they shone through in the end.

2

1 ↓

Geelong

12-0

They really had to struggle to beat Freo, and the best team in the comp shouldn’t need to struggle against Freo, so they drop a place.

3

3↔

Bulldogs

8-4

The Dogs slaughtered Port. And with a percentage of 123, they’re effectively 2 games ahead of the pack of teams on 7 wins.

Looking

good

4

4↔

Carlton

6-6

They lost, but geez, they looked good. A win against the Blues is a big win. With Essendon, Freo, Richmond and Sydney up next, they look good to be 10-6.

5

5↔

Collingwood

7-5

A tough win in Sydney. Their run gets’ tougher after the next two easy ones of Freo and Essendon.

6

6↔

Brisbane

7-5

12 minutes mark 3rd quarter. Lions down 48-36. They then kicked the next 9 goals; Hawks kicked 2 pints and a rushed behind.

7

7↔

Adelaide

7-5

In wet, horrible conditions the Crows took a while to get going; but when they did it was over very quickly. Sydney, Richmond and Freo up next – need to win all 3. Because then comes the Saints, Port Geelong and Collingwood.

Need

some

wins

8

8↔

Hawthorn

6-6

The Hawks will not win the flag. They won’t even make the preliminary final.

9

11↑

Essendon

6-6

A win over Melbourne doesn't count. You want respect? Beat the Blues, Collingwood and Sydney, because they’re your next 3.

10

10↔

Sydney

5-7

If the Swans don’t beat the Crows this week they won’t make the finals.

11

9↓

Port Adelaide

6-6

Port were pathetic. I love it. Geelong and Brisbane up next. Will Williams survive this week?

No

chance

12

12↔

North Melbourne

4-8

Cheer up North fans, the last North coach to be sacked after a loss to the Crows was Wayne Schimmelbusch, and he was replaced by Denis Pagan…

13

13↔

Fremantle

3-9

You see, this is why you never should tip Freo – they tease, but never deliver.

14

15↑

Richmond

3-9

A first up win for the new coach. If they beat the Saints this week, Jade Rawlings will be the Tigers’ coach in 2010.

15

14↓

West Coast

3-9

The West Coast might almost start favourite this week against the Hawks at Subiaco, and are a chance to start underdogs the following week against Melbourne at the MCG – that says it all really.